History of the Crusades

the Crusades Episode 226, the Baltic, the Baltic Crusades, the Prussian Crusade Part 8,

Legalities. Hello again.

Last week we saw the Teutonic Knights establish a base for themselves in a castle they named

Vogelsung across the river from the region around Calm in Prussia.

While the fact that only seven Teutonic knights were based at Vogelsung meant that they could not currently use it to conquer Prussia.

Parties of knights did regularly raid into Prussia, familiarizing themselves with the land and its people and forcibly converting

the occasional Prussian they came across.

Last week we also saw William of Moderner arrive in the northern part of Prussia and slowly work his way southwards towards Vogelsung, learning the language, chatting with the locals, and attempting to familiarize

himself with the pagans that the Paper Sea would like brought under the wing of Rome.

Interestingly, William of Moderna left Prussia in January 1230.

Even more interestingly, the first place he seems to have travelled to when he returned to Central

Europe was Italy, where he met up with Hermann von Salzre.

Now there is no record of what took place at this meeting, but later in the year 1230, Hermann von Souser sent a small army of Teutonic Knights to Vogelsung

under the command of another Herman, a man called Hermann Boltck.

Now Hermann Boltck seems to have been a capable and well respected military commander,

a man who was quite rational and reasonable in dealing with everyone except pagans.

When it came to pagans, he was merciless and entirely cold-hearted.

So I guess he was the ideal man to place in command of an army,

which was to be used to subdue the feisty and warlike pagans of Prussia. Hermann Balkk also seems to have

been a stickler for detail because one of the first things he wanted to do when he arrived at

Vogelsung was to clarify the legal situation regarding conquests by the Teutonic Order inside Prussia.

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